THE chief executive of the Royal Surrey County Hospital has come forward to praise the Pint-A-Week campaign and talk about what the new building will mean to the foundation trust.

“I think the campaign is brilliant,” declared Nick Moberly. “I am absolutely convinced we are going to do it.

“I am so grateful to the Prostate Project for running with this fantastic campaign and hugely grateful to the Surrey Advertiser for giving it prominence.”

Mr Moberly paid tribute to the Prostate Project’s work and said that the charity was an example of how fundraising should be done.

He said: “We do have partner charities and we do have a number who typically specialise, but the Prostate Project absolutely stands out for its vision, fantastic dynamism and its effectiveness in reaching out to the local community.

“I think it is an absolute example of how charities and hospitals can come together to deliver important objectives.

“They have an absolutely brilliant record of mobilising support for prostate cancer treatments.

“They have done well in the past and are going about this in exactly the right way – simple and easy for people to get their heads around and to make contribution towards.”

The chief executive said that while the new centre would be for the treatment of patients more generally, an important aspect of the work would be on prostate cancer.

“Certainly from our point of view, prostate cancer is at the heart of it and an important focus for us as a local general hospital,” he said.

“Obviously, we are a tertiary specialist cancer centre and one of the best performing cancer centres in the country.

“Within that, urological cancer is a big area of specialism and our reputation as a centre for the diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer is second to none really.”

Mr Moberly pointed to the broad range of treatments available at the Royal Surrey – from robotic prostate surgery to brachytherapy, where tiny radioactive seeds are inserted into the prostate gland.

“We are one of the leading centres and one of the biggest and most experienced centres in the whole country,” said Mr Moberly.

“We offer an array of treatments and, in terms of prostate cancer, we are one of the best centres nationally.

We are always striving to offer the very, very best in specialist care.”

Mr Moberly said the new urological centre and the treatments it will offer will help to keep the hospital at the top of its game.

He said: “Clearly patients from Guildford and Waverley come here, but also from all over Surrey, Hampshire and beyond.

“The centre will massively improve the patient experience. At the moment we are operating from very cramped facilities, so there will be massive improvement.”